Wasting good money on poor advertising — CL Tang

APRIL 27 — Ever since Nomination Day on April 20, The Star readers have been inundated with the MCA’s full-colour advertisements, exhorting Malaysians that a vote for the DAP is a vote for PAS.

On a daily basis, there are at least six full pages of such ads. A full-colour page ad in The Star costs between RM30,000 and RM44,800, depending on the page placement. Taking an average of RM35,000 per page, the MCA would have spent more than RM3 million over the course of 15 days. And that’s just for The Star alone.

The sheer extravagance of the MCA’s publicity stunt again illustrates just why it fails to connect with the people it claims to represent; RM3 million could have been better spent on Chinese schools, scholarships, medical bills, etc, things that actually help people. Instead, the MCA is engaged in a distasteful PR blitz that aims to scare the Chinese into not voting for its rival, the DAP. There is not a single thread of information about the MCA’s manifesto and election promises. Zilch.

If the MCA has touched base with the Malaysian Chinese sentiments on the ground, it would have realised just how spectacularly this scaremongering campaign has backfired. It goes to show just how out of touch the party is, throwing massive amounts of cash day after day to propagate a falsehood that a large majority of people refuse to believe.

Poor advertising coupled with a poor product spells disaster for the MCA’s distasteful ad strategy. The MCA should cease this expensive and wasteful campaign immediately before it turns off even more sensible Malaysians. And put this money to better use.

The MCA should realise that a good product sells itself. I guess that’s their biggest problem.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.

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